When I started this blog I made a little promise to myself that when writing up a match against an Italian team I’d go out of my way to avoid headlines which made any reference to Joe Dolce’s “Whassa Matta You”.
Sadly, now that Aironi & Treviso are in the Magners League, I’ll have to go back on it, especially when the utility back plays so well and hands me the pun on a plate!
Naturally our focus should be on the next generation of Irish stars when Leinster play during a Six Nations campaign, but they still need the glue Nacewa provides to hold them together. The two missed kicks can be forgiven (the first came after he got a clatter and the second was from the corner) but particularly in the second half he was at the heart of everything positive from the home side, and his mercurial “catch by the touchline on his own 22, stay in play, then kick to touch on opposite 22” was the best of a long list of heroic contributions by last night’s Man of the Match.
Overall, the match bore many resemblances to that in Rome last Saturday. An Irish team fancied to beat an Italian one struggled to do so, having gone behind and relying on a strong start to the second half to get their momentum going.
And as for the performances of the Leinster younglings, we had the good, the bad and the downright ugly.
Luckily it was mostly good. David Kearney particularly impressed me, and not just by the way he finished his match-winning try whilst being relieved of his shorts. Niall Morris also had a good outing with a try AND a try-saving tackle, with O’Malley, skipper Ruddock and (albeit briefly) McKinley also doing well.
The bad was from Ian Madigan, whose inadequacies were laid bare by the visitors. Two poor clearances cost us a total of ten points, and what’s more I’ve seen players his size stop someone like Nick Williams before yet he was bulldozed out of it. Don’t mean to be too hard on the Rock 10 though, he has plenty of time to improve.
Thing is though, it’s a high standard being set at Leinster these days and when assessing a youngster you have to ask yourself : “would I be confident of them doing the business in the Heineken Cup?” and Mads fell short on the night.
Also bad, but in this case bad luck, fell to poor Brendan Macken, After impressive showings for Leinster A and Ireland Under 20 it was an all-too-brief debut for the senior team and hopefully his broken collar bone will heal soon.
Now for the “ugly”….Paul O’Donoghue’s display. I really rated him when I first saw him in the AIB final in 2009 but at this level he seems shockingly slow from the base of the ruck, and I mean “slower-than-O’Leary” slow. It was his errant pass that put Aironi on our line and eventually led to their try, and not long afterwards he chucked it straight at Erasmus who really should have added a second in the corner.
Now of COURSE, I have to hand it to Aironi for making this such a contest. Branded a “rag-tag fugitive fleet” by a witty tweeter beforehand, they’d have been forgiven for keeping the shutters down with a 10-man game throughout to keep it tight, but instead they weren’t shy of the odd chip n chase and really put it up to us. This was their first ever Magners League point on the road and had they not missed a couple of easy kicks they may have gotten more.
And after the “drive for five” try drought by Munster, JUST how ironic was it that Nick Williams got their more-than-deserved touchdown?
In yet more irony, on what was labelled “referees night” thanks to a Q&A session afterward by Alan Lewis & Alain Rolland, it has to be said Nigel Owens had a shocker. Unless it was his intention to ignore Aironi’s repeated offside transgressions in the second half, in which case he had a blinder! And in case you think my bias got the better of me, I was seated RIGHT on their 22, and lost count of the times they were in our forwards’ faces too early.
But let this match be remembered by the positives…four league points, up to second in the league, home record still intact, and in the most part impressive showings by the provinces’ future stars.
All in all an enjoyable Thursday night out for my son and I.
